Jade Dragon Mountain (25 page)

“You did not know of the Khampa purse that the murderer had planted in the room in order to implicate them. So you could not have known that taking the cup would interfere with the murderer's plans, and draw attention away from the murderer's intended scapegoats and back to the mansion.”

“Damn bad luck,” said Gray, with feeling. “But you see, don't you, that I did nothing against any law? My actions may have been foolish, but in the moment it was all I could think of to do.”

“Did Pieter say anything before he died, or make any gesture?”

Gray shook his head immediately. “There was no time.”

“And you saw no one in the gardens on your way to or from his room?”

“Oh—vague figures, certainly. Couples in the shadows, bannermen and soldiers patrolling. No one I recognized, except for the Lady Chen. But now I have helped you—now you know that the murderer prepared the tea just before Brother Pieter and I arrived at the room. And in return—will you keep my involvement between us alone?”

“Sir Gray, I have no investment in the deals made between your company and this empire. And I have no wish to involve myself. I will not speak of any of this unless it necessary to my investigation that I do so.”

Gray looked as if he might say more, but something in Li Du's face stopped him. “Then we have no quarrel. As long as I am allowed to present the Company's gifts in the time and manner previously agreed upon, then I am content. And now, if you have no more questions for me, I would like to return to the pavilion—the carpenters will not understand how the beams are to be fitted together.”

Li Du acquiesced, and they retraced their steps in uneasy silence. Gray's confirmation of what Li Du had guessed should have been satisfying, but it was not. Gray had acquitted himself well in their conversation, and yet, somehow, Li Du was not sanguine as to Nicholas Gray's innocence.

 

Chapter 14

The Office of City Records had the atmosphere of a beehive. Like all the government buildings in Dayan, it had been commandeered for use in festival preparations. Harried officials in black caps and red robes dashed in and out of the open doors, carrying, arranging, reading, and occasionally dropping ledgers, seals, and velvet bags that clinked when they were set down.

Just as he had successfully nudged his way through the door, Li Du recognized Mu Gao coming out of the building. The old man did not see Li Du squeezed among all the others. He was carrying a bundle of papers under his arm, and his attention was on keeping his balance. He limped down the street toward the mansion, leaning heavily on his cane.

Li Du attempted to ask one of the officials for assistance, but the young man shook his head with an expression of panic and began to stammer a garbled excuse until he was interrupted by a corpulent merchant in purple silk who yelled that he was still waiting for a receipt for the silver.

“I was promised four places on the fourth platform,” he cried. “I just gave you so much silver that you should give me ten places! Six places then! I want written assurances!”

The harassed secretary had just produced a piece of paper and begun to write on it when a small group of caravan merchants pushed their way inside. One of them consulted a parchment and announced to the room, “Delivery of ten thousand candles for the river flower lanterns. Where do we receive payment?” No one answered, and he opened his mouth to speak again when a bearded man in a yellow robe emerged from another room and roared, “The crystal of at least four lanterns is cracked! They must be replaced!”

Li Du was jostled this way and that until he felt hot and panicked himself. He was beginning to think that he had wasted his time when he felt someone take a firm grip on his elbow. He looked down and saw that an old man was holding his sleeve with an ink-stained hand wrinkled and gray with parchment dust. The man gestured to indicate that they could not speak over the commotion, and ushered Li Du through the crowd until they passed through a small door into the deeper interior of the building.

With each door they passed through it became quieter, until finally they were alone in a dim, tranquil room. The windows were shaded by faded silk screens, amber and beige rectangles of light surrounded by drifting dust motes. The walls were lined with cabinets of lacquered wood, each drawer labeled with black or red painted dates. Some of them had been crossed out and replaced with newer dates. Others had been altered by pasting paper sheets over the originals, on which were written titles such as:
Fourth Register of Temples
and
Ninth Tablet of Tea from the Fifth Reigning Year
and
Porcelain Delivered Tenth Year
.

The room had, in spite of its disorder and slightly musty odor, the sanctified feel of a library. Compared to Tulishen's library this room's paper shades and book spines were poorly matched. The lacquer was scratched, and corners of paper peeped from open drawers. But what it lacked in upkeep it made up for in earnest use. The drawers looked rifled, memorized, studied. The desk was slightly discolored from tea stains on the wood. Clean paper was arranged in colored stacks, and the brushes dangling from the brush holder were still damp.

“If you are actually at the office of records in search of records,” said the man, “I'm the only one who can help you. I'm too old to run around counting coins and haggling with nobles over how close they may sit to the Emperor.” He made a dismissive gesture that turned into a welcoming wave at a low chair.

“Now, you sit there, and I will sit here, and let me pour you some tea,” he said. Li Du watched as he prepared the tea, and noticed that despite his age his hands did not shake. The man lifted the heavy kettle full of water and took it outside to a courtyard fire. When he came back he said, “It was already hot. It just needs another moment to be perfect. But what was I saying? Ah, yes—I'm too old for that nonsense. All those young secretaries terrified they'll be blamed for a tarnished spittoon. And all that silk and gauze delivered every day—if you sewed it all together you could shroud the whole mountain with it. But after the festival it will be torn and trampled trash, all of it. Sad waste, I say. Never liked waste. I'm called Old Mu, by the way, city clerk.”

“I think that I have met a relation of yours. You must know Mu Gao, the custodian of the library?”

Old Mu cocked his head in the direction of the kettle outside, as if he could hear the water reaching its appropriate temperature. He shuffled out and returned holding the kettle, his sleeve drawn down to protect his hand from the hot handle. He talked while he prepared the tea. “Mu Gao is my dearest friend, my cousin. We used to walk together in my wife's garden—
wandering through jade bamboo
—and now that we are too bent to walk easily, we sit and talk,
as the stars go down
…” He brought Li Du the cup of tea and passed it to him with both hands, bowing his head as he made the polite offering.

It was Pu'erh tea, and Old Mu had rinsed and steeped it to perfection. Li Du drew in the fragrance that clouded from the darkening liquid, the thick dissonance of fermentation and the dry, insistent power emerging from the unfurling leaves. He sipped and felt his vision clear, his chest warm, and his heart beat with increased enthusiasm for its work. Old Mu took his own cup to the desk and sat down.

“Mu Gao does not seem to take very much pleasure in his work at the magistrate's library,” said Li Du.

Old Mu's expression became sad. “Well,” he said, “you must not mind him. I am very lucky—my wife is still alive, cantankerous and clever as a good old woman should be, and our children are good strong farmers with children of their own, well outside of the city, where life is not so different from what it was before. But Mu Gao is alone, and his mind is not always clear. He knows that his place is in the mansion—but he was not meant to be a servant there. We grow old, and bitter, drinking together and remembering the days when our family had vigor. We were the most powerful family in the province, you know.”

Old Mu pulled himself up and refilled the small cups with water. Then he creaked slowly back down into his chair and went on: “But even in our days of greatness there was never such a festival as this. Every craftsman in the south of China has been working for months on festival decorations.” He raised his hands and gesticulated as he listed the items he had seen: “Paintings, screens embroidered with dragons, incense, incense holders, lamps, bells, drums, flags, poems on silk, miniature trees, pear wood chairs, even tiny pleasure boats for the canal … It is going to be a spectacle. I'm as eager as the next man to see our mighty Emperor. It's the crowds and waste I don't like.”

Li Du nodded in agreement.

“But,” went on Old Mu, “I have not asked you why you are here. I think I know who you are—the magistrate's cousin?”

“Yes, I am. I came here to ask if any records exist of foreign visitors to Dayan. I am interested in the events of thirty years ago, before the Qing magistrate arrived.”

Old Mu cooed a little under his breath. “Well,” he said, “there's many a cup of tea been drunk in all that time. Hm.” He took a key from a drawer in the desk, and moved to a small cabinet in one corner of the room. He opened it, rifled through the contents, and emerged with a ledger, crisp and undamaged, its ink still bright. “Here it is,” he said. “And what would that be? The ninth reigning year of our good Emperor. Not many Chinese in these parts at the time. We saw some odd types on the caravans, of course, but that foreigner, the one you're interested in, the one who died, well, he was different as they come. Hair pale as a lotus root in oil.”

“You remember him?”

Old Mu nodded. “I do. Would have liked to see him again…” He left the sentence unfinished.

“And he stayed in Dayan several months?”

“Almost a whole year, yes, but not in Dayan. We were having one of our quarrels with the Khampa, and he stayed in a safer place. Ah, yes, here it is. He wrote down his name—not in a script I know.” Li Du looked down at where Old Mu was pointing. He read, in brushed ink:

Pieter van Dalen

Beside the name was a brief description in Chinese:

Strangelander holy man, traveling with Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzhang, servant Feng (see below). Presented to Mu Zeng gifts accepted with gratitude. 1 small clock for telling hours in central style. 1 book of foreign make, leather binding, with painted pages. 50 taels silver. First letter of introduction bearing seal of Jia Zheng of Board of Rites in Forbidden City. Second letter of introduction bearing seal of Magistrate Tao of Pu'erh prefecture. Third letter from Mu Zhong, son to the cousin of Mu Zeng, current student of respected status in Beijing. Fourth letter bearing seal of Fr. Verbiest, giving permission for his student to bring teachings to greater empire region. Taken in by the hospitality of the Zhao family in Snow Village. Departed ninth reigning year, seventh month in good health with gifts.

“And was it you who wrote this entry?” asked Li Du.

“No—that was before I became a record keeper. I was just a secretary and a scoundrel. This record keeper, Loh, died years ago. He had a good hand, though, and mixed his ink very well.”

“This village—is it the same Snow Village that lies on the foothills of the mountain?”

“Yes, that is it. Just over the lowest ridge, on the river side. A long day's journey from Dayan. A humble place, except for its wine.”

“And, the Zhao family? Did you know them?”

“Yes—they are a large family.”

“And do you know if there was anyone at that time who might have had a motive to wish Brother Pieter dead? Someone who might have held a grudge all these years?”

“No—I cannot think of anyone.”

“It was a time of divided loyalties,” said Li Du. “The Ming had been defeated, but they still had many supporters, especially in this part of the empire. Might Brother Pieter have been involved in some plot? There were Jesuits who wished for the Ming to return.”

Old Mu raised his hands helplessly. “I really don't remember anything like that,” he said. “We were fighting anyone who happened to be trying to kill us or steal from us. The foreigner would not have been part of that. From what I recall, he was a gentle, prettily mannered young man with a fondness for books and poetry. He did not want to be a burden to anyone. A helpful sort of man.”

Li Du stood up and thanked Old Mu. As he left, he turned and asked, “Was Mu Gao drinking wine with you on the night of the murder?”

Old Mu took only a moment to deliberate, then nodded with certainty. “Yes—the banquet night. He doesn't go to the magistrate's banquets. We shared a bottle of good strong wine, raised our cups to the moon and drank to the ancestors.”

Li Du thanked Old Mu again and departed the records office. He ate a bowl of noodles at a shop, and felt much better once he had finished. The Sichuan pepper danced, metallic, on his tongue, and the thick, salty broth rejuvenated him. He would have need of the energy, he thought, for his next task. He had to go to the mansion and make a report to his cousin.

*   *   *

Tulishen had inadvertently scheduled two appointments for the same time that evening. Li Du found him pacing in the office with the painting of the Kangxi on the wall, talking half to himself and half to Jia Huan, who stood listening patiently, his velvet cap so clean it might have been new, his expression attentive and sympathetic. As usual he held a bouquet of scrolls of varied size and color under one arm.

“It must be Cheng,” said Tulishen. He had glanced up through drawn brows when Li Du had entered, but ignored him. He repeated, with decision, “It must be Cheng. He is a Director at the Board of Revenue. Ju-hai is only—what did you say he was?”

“A second secretary at the Board of Censors,” said Jia Huan.

Tulishen grunted. “Yes,” he said, with satisfaction. “That is not so prestigious. I will be late to my meeting with him, and keep the appointment with Cheng.”